ProMotion Pictures Gets Fresh

On Tuesday, April 10th, NYU
ProMotion Pictures held its annual
gala celebration at Tribeca
Cinemas’ Varick Room. This event was the
culmination of a year-long partnership with
Subway, during which student teams of
MBAs and MFAs from Stern,Tisch Kanbar
Film Institute and NYU’s Interactive
Telecommunications Program (ITP) developed
and produced multimedia branded
entertainment projects for the company.The
gala was attended by notable NYU faculty
and staff, including Dean Gary Fraser, Vice
Dean of Graduate Education Adam
Brandenburger, Al Lieberman and Sam
Craig, Tisch Graduate Film Chair John
Tintori and ITP Professor Katherine Dillon.

Guest speakers included Subway’s Global
Chief Marketing Officer Tony Pace.

For those unfamiliar with the program,
ProMotion Pictures was established in 2004
by Stern MBAs Russ Axelrod, Jeffrey
Grossman and Erik Zuckermann. It was initially
designed to to provide NYU Stern and
Tisch Kanbar Film students with the opportunity
to collaborate on a series of innovative
film projects for a sponsoring brand.Previous
sponsors of the competition include Verizon,
Johnnie Walker, Volvo, Heineken, Unilever
(AXE), I Love NY and Vita Coco.

Last summer, the incoming Executive
Producers of ProMotion Pictures, led by
MBA2s Harmony Davis and Krystal
Bowden and MBA/MFA candidates Colin
Whitlow and Geoff Mansfield, established a
third partnership with ITP – an interdisciplinary
graduate program at Tisch that
focuses on the intersection of art, design and
technology. Students at each of these three
schools (Stern,Tisch and ITP) now have the
opportunity to compete for the chance collaborate
on fully-funded multimedia projects
commissioned by a sponsoring brand.

With the expansion of the program came
an expansion in leadership as well, including
MBA1s Anna Wiggins, Whitney
Rothe and Libby Klein, MBA/MFA
Candidate Cathy Yan, and ITP students
Genevieve Hoffman and Emily Webster.

This team of all-stars managed the
film/technology production process, the
client relationship with Subway and the
premiere at SXSW. They also helped drive
ongoing improvements to the program
throughout the year, including educational
seminars to guide students through the
development stage of their projects, and the
establishment of a professional Advisory
Board consisting of industry leaders such as
Doug Scott, President of Ogilvy
Entertainment, and Evan Shapiro, newly
dubbed President of Participant Television.

For ProMotion Pictures’ ambitious 2011-
12 challenge, two talented NYU teams
were selected to craft an experience that
integrates multimedia into a 3-episode
series as part of the SUBWAY FRESH
ARTISTS™ FILMMAKERS program,
with a brand brief entitled, “Every
Breakfast Sandwich Tells A Story.”
“We are pleased to provide an outlet for aspiring
filmmakers to pursue their passion,” said
Subway CMO Tony Pace. Students’ creative
concepts were judged by a panel that included
industry-insiders James Widdoes (Director of
“Two and a Half Men”) and Brian
Baumgartner (Emmy Award-winning actor
from NBC’s “The Office”).The two winning
series that were selected were: The Loop, a
comedy featuring two friends stuck in a time
loop, and Tech Up, about an ambitious young
man determined to get his tech start-up company
going, but without an office space is
working out of a Subway restaurant. Both
series premiered at the IFC Crossroads
House in March at the 2012 SXSW Festival.

They are also featured on MyDamnChannel
and IFC.com; each episode has received over
100,000 views to date.

“Opening the SUBWAY FRESH
ARTISTS FILMMAKERS project to students
in three different programs within
NYU created a tremendous amount of
energy and enthusiasm in our community,”
said Sam Craig, Director of the
Entertainment, Media and Technology
Program at Stern.“Today’s content industry
depends upon creative, business and technological
excellence, and the opportunity
for our students to combine forces has been
truly inspiring for them and our faculty.”
Last month’s gala featured a screening of the
students’ winning web series at Tribeca
Cinemas, followed by a cocktail reception in
the Varick Room. During the reception,
guests had the opportunity to interact with
multimedia components of the Subway project.

ITP student Justin Lange (of Team
Loop) developed a mobile app that allows
users to view additional video segments with
the series cast and includes a GPS feature
that helps users locate the nearest Subway
restaurant. Fellow ITP student Lily
Szajnberg (of Team Tech Up) developed an
interactive photo booth with Microsoft
Kinect technology that measured guest’s
hand movements and printed a photo with a
custom-sized Subway sandwich overlaid
onto the image – this technology was the
basis for the Tech Up series concept, and was
featured prominently in the final episode.

Sneak Peak: The ProMotion Pictures
team is already hard at work planning next
year’s program. Students will have the
opportunity to pitch project ideas to the
Innocence Project, a national litigation
and public policy organization dedicated
to exonerating wrongfully convicted individuals
and reforming the criminal justice
system. Stay tuned for more details!
In addition to the huge amount of faculty
support,ProMotion Pictures was also helped
by NYU staff members Tom Kozak,Carolyn
Ritter, Janet Lyden and Diana Hyde
throughout the year, and were instrumental
to its success. Congratulations to all students
who participated in this year’s program!